The Memorial Library
by chocolatula
Summary: A suburban town set in the 1990's can be home to some of the strangest emotions that maybe sometimes you need more than a friend to help you get through them.


There was an eerie silence that enveloped the library. It was so silent that if you were to slam a book or even make petty footsteps, the sound would echo throughout the building as if it were a hollow cave. Given the emptiness of the library, the sound of a keyboard clacking away was quickly filling the area. There sat a young man on a table at the very end, lone with his laptop open and his eyes glued upon the screen. It was clear he wouldn't be taking those eyes off anytime soon, and there was a doubt that he could even if he tried.

On the side of his laptop, a few books were stacked atop each other. Not many, but their thick shell and plentiful pages made up for taking up space. On the hardback covers were words relating to coding and computer technology. The average person would not understand a single word in such intermediate books on the subject, but this man was an expert. He didn't want to believe he was, and instead thought of himself as someone who needed much more work before he could happily accept his degree in computing science. He wanted to feel like he truly deserved it. The distracting sound of footsteps had begun ringing through his ears, but he ignored them with a little bit of difficulty. It was different than usual, barely anyone ever came near his table and his curiosity made his eyes flicker up for a moment to catch a glimpse of who it was.

It was a man.

A tall man, in fact. He had never seen his face around before nor did he really care to. In his hands, a few books just as thick as the ones on his own table were pressed against his chest. For a moment, his attention was completely dragged away from his illuminated screen, squinting at the spine of the books. He could only make out some strange text until he figured it must've been some boring, old history books. This simmered his interest down by a mile. Shame too.

Suddenly there was a faint beeping noise, causing his attention to snap back to his laptop. His eyes narrowed through his darkened glasses as he began typing furiously, his eyebrows furrowed.

"No, no, no- FUCK!" The loud cuss followed by him slamming his hands on the table was sent echoing throughout the entire building, a few eyes glancing upon him as the librarian walked over and hushed him with a glare.

"We will not have this sort of behavior in the library, Mr. Captor. You should understand this by now. Behave." She hissed under her breath, turning on her heel and leaving before he could retort or make up excuses.

He rubbed his temples as his laptop shut itself down for safety precautions, causing him to bury his face in his hands and groan. A pair of crystal blue eyes fell upon him, his footsteps grew increasingly louder the closer he got.

"Wow, some fuck up you did there." A voice sneered, putting his books down beside him.

He lifted his head lazily and looked up, dazed and lost. Rather than responding politely (as if he ever did), he simply brought up his curled up fist and slowly raised his middle finger towards the man. He simply scoffed at this and sat down, opening a book.

"You'd think that you could learn some fuckin' manners." He muttered sarcastically, his eyes shadowed by the thick frames of his glasses, scanning the words in the book for information.

"Buzz off."

"What?" He glanced over towards him, seeing him rub the bridge of his nose in annoyance.

"I said buzz off for fuck's sake, are you deaf?" His lips curled down into a scowl as he closed his laptop with a slight _bang._

For a moment, the man just stared at him with an appalled expression, then a glower. His nails dug into the book lightly as he took a deep breath and crossed his arms. "I'm not going anywhere. Deal with it, you scum." He countered, frowning heavily.

The Captor was taken aback by this, not expecting him to have made a reasonably good come back. Usually people would just not bother with him, making this conversation some sort of new 'experience' for him. He didn't back down though.

"Listen, asshole," he began, leaning forwards to get closer to him so he wouldn't have to talk above a whisper, "I don't want anything to do with you and believe me, you don't want anything to do with me, so why don't you just-"

"What's your name?" He interrupted, his face showing nothing but a stoic attitude. It was touched up with a light spark of interest, but the other young man just stared baffled at the sudden question. He took this as a sign to explain why he needed to know. "You must be some sort of half-witted pin in a never-ending haystack. I'm not going to associate myself in a petty argument if I don't know your name at the very least, _Mr. Captor_." He belittled him, putting a strong, accented emphasis on whatever his name was to his knowledge.

He stared frozen at him, about to complain that he shouldn't associate himself with him in the first place, but decided not to. He sighed a heavy breath, raking a hand through his hair before responding reluctantly. "Sollux."

"Sollux… That's a fuckin' strange name you got there." A light chuckle escaped his lips as he intertwined his fingers together, resting his chin upon them, his elbows propped on the table right below the open book.

"Yea I'm sure yours is one that angels grace." He rolled his eyes, closing a book he had open and putting them neatly aside along with his laptop.

"Eridan Ampora. Not that strange, mind you. Better than your sad excuse of a name." He retorted, before Sollux's eyes could catch glimpse of the librarian gesturing them to keep it down. He sighed before sealing his lips and taking out his iPod.

Nothing but a few good tunes to drown out the consistent sound of an annoying stranger would do the trick. He dug the ear buds in his ears, Eridan raising an eyebrow before questioning his actions. Sollux didn't respond to that, turning the volume up a notch to beat out his voice. Eridan frowned at this, folding his arms up on the table as his eyes daggered into Sollux's own, only to be ignored.

"I hardly know you an' I'm already annoyed by you." He huffed, the sound of heels tapping against the ground catching his attention.

A young woman, no older than 19 was quickly making her way towards the table the two were sitting at. Her smile was wide and a fresh relief to Eridan from the miniscule argument he had earlier. Sollux kept his head down, still not able to hear a thing, lightly bobbing his head to the music instead of paying mind to his surroundings. The lady eventually reached the table, coming to a stop right next to Sollux, her high volume hair bouncing along.

"Hey, Sollux!" She giggled.

Sollux felt the shadow cast over him as he gave her an uninterested glance, raising an eyebrow and taking an ear piece out. "FF?"

Eridan sat there, feeling ignored by her. It was none other than his good friend, Feferi Peixes, and he'd be damned if he were to get passed over for some bag of bones for a human.

"Fef, m'right here you know?" He muttered, turning in his chair to face her.

This had caught her attention as she looked at him and merely waved with a small smile, not giving mention to his name before immediately turning back to Sollux.

"Sollux, I-"

There was the sound of a chair being pushed back, distracting her from what she was about to say. Eridan had grabbed his books and grimaced at the two, pushing the chair in and dropping the books on the table opposite of them. He wouldn't have being ignored like that, and he didn't plan to stay any longer to face the disregard she gave him. Feferi sighed and brushed it off her shoulder, yet again facing Sollux once more. Sollux just stared at Eridan and shook his head, somewhat glad he finally left before leaning back on his chair and taking his other ear piece out, completely turning the iPod off and placing it on top of his closed laptop.

"Sorry about that." He grumbled, gesturing for Feferi to sit next to him, and so she did happily.

"Oh it's alright. One can only get used to his stubborn behavior, you know?" She smiled reassuringly, placing a hand over Sollux's own. "Now, as I was saying…" And so they began their conversation, Eridan's eyes still glued upon them no matter how hard he tried to ignore them.

He was torn apart between reading his book and keeping an eye on Feferi, deciding to instead neglect the chore of paying attention to them and concentrating on studying his books. He wasn't going to pay them any mind no matter how hard it'll be.

"Why do you need all these books, Sollux? I shelldom think you'd need them at all!" She sneaked a fish pun in, smiling wide at that little accomplishment as Sollux gave a breathy chuckle.

"I heard that, FF. Don't think you're getting away with that slip of the tongue." He smirked at her, getting up from his seat and stacking the books neatly upon each other after having opened one for Feferi to see. "And of course I need them. I'm not at the top of my game yet FF. You won't get employed by knowing just enough, you need to be the very best and that's what I'm aiming to be. I'm nowhere close though." He gave the books a glimpse that was somewhat sad, shaking it off at a second glance.

"Oh Sollux…" Feferi huffed, crossing her arms and giving him a worried glance, "I'm sure you're perfectly fine and in fact brilliant at whatever it is you're doing. I hardly know a thing about it so I can't say for sure." She gave a warm smile to reassure him, giving his shoulder a touch of her hand. "You're great, Sollux. You don't need to be any greater. Stop pushing yourself or you'll get stressed."

"Feferi." Sollux said sharply, catching her attention. "You wouldn't understand what I'm going to have to go to after this whole thing blows over. You're born rich, heck, everyone here was. I was lucky enough to grace this school with a scholarship, and I'm not going to let that go to waste. If I'm going to accomplish big things in life and expect a decent pay at the very least, then I gotta work for it."

Feferi blinked at him before she spread a tender grin. "Yes. Yes, of course." She nodded in agreement. "I'm proud of you. I'll stick by you and root for you through your journey to be the very, _very _best. You can count on it!" And with that, she stood up, immediately on her tippy toes to give Sollux's forehead a quick peck.

Sollux's cheeks heated up a considerable amount at the affectionate gesture, looking at her with stunned eyes. The only one who had ever given him any sort of kiss was his fathers, and that was expected. Before he knew it, Feferi was already making her way out of the library and Sollux made no time at all stumbling on his feet to catch up with her, leaving his belongings as well as Eridan behind to crumple up a few written on sheets of paper in disgust. He ignored it though. He called out to Feferi and for a moment, the way the light hit her past the door made him stop, along with his heart.

She looked perfect. Radiant. _Beautiful._

He bit back on his lower lip as he made his way slowly towards her, scratching the back of his neck in nervousness. He didn't know why he was so nervous, it wasn't like it was a hard thing to ask.

"Uh…"

He slapped himself mentally as he straightened himself out. Great start, Sollux. Now you're in for it.

"That kiss… The one you gave me just now," his eyes glinted a little with hope, but he refused to look her in the eye, "did that… mean anything?" He asked under his breath.

Feferi had to lean closer just to catch what he said, her eyebrows shooting up at the question before she put a hand at her own pink lips.

"Oh no…" She sighed before giving him a sad smile. "Sollux… You mean the world to me, you really do but-"

"Not in that way. Yea, I figured." He replied for her, cutting her off.

Feferi sealed her lips for a moment, looking down. "I'm sorry for having mislead you, Sollux. I have to go now, okay? I hope things aren't awkward between us." She gave him a quick hug and turned to rush off.

Sollux took in a deep breath, holding it in for a bit before exhaling. He raked his fingers through his hair as he strolled back into the library towards his seat. In his seat, however, Eridan decided upon himself to occupy it, looking somewhat bored until he noticed the Captor making his way to the table.

"Y'should really reconsider this habit a' leavin' your things unattended to. Especially if it's a laptop. I'm pretty damn sure someone a' your standards couldn't afford a new one." He commented snarkily, his face holding a calm but smug expression. He got up and took the laptop, shoving it into Sollux's chest and only letting go when Sollux took hold of it. Before Sollux could open his mouth to speak, Eridan was already on his way out.

Sollux muttered a few insulting curses under his breath as he put the laptop back down on the table. He would have to read the books instead of working hands-on now. Theory was all he had left for the night until he could fix his laptop some other day when he was free. He sat down and took a big book, opening it up and beginning to read, his eyes not leaving the sight of the pages.

The clock ticked, hours passed and soon, night fell upon the library. Sollux had finished a book and was in the middle of the second one, letting out a yawn as his finger trailed upon the words.

"Mr. Captor?"

He looked up dazedly, the librarian standing in front of his desk, a few books that had been discarded carelessly in her hands.

"I think it's about time you went home and had some well deserved rest, wouldn't you think so?" She smiled a wrinkled smile at him and he smiled back, nodding.

"Yes… Yes, you're right." And with that, Sollux stood up from his seat and closed the book, holding it to himself. "I'll be borrowing this if you don't mind."

She waved her hand at him, gesturing him that he could do as he pleased given that it was all for a good cause, and walked away. Sollux yawned once more, taking his laptop and putting both of the things he had in his hands into his backpack, slumping it over his shoulder lazily. He dragged his feet out of the library, watching as she closed the door and locked it up, the golden light that was being emitted earlier were dim now.

Sollux walked his way back to the cheapest hostel he could afford provided by the university. It wasn't very far from the library, thankfully, and he wasn't sharing his room with anyone. Most of the students either stayed at their own houses or very expensive hostels and dorms. Sollux fumbled around for his keys in his pocket, finding them and unlocking the door, opening it. It was dark, which was expected anyway. It had a lonely feeling to it, and he couldn't blame the place for it. It was his fault for isolating himself so much. No traces of friendship were in this house, he never invited anyone over.

He supposed it was for the best in the end. He could get peace and quiet without being bothered and he wouldn't bother anyone. It was pretty ideal to what he wanted anyway. He flicked the light switch on and the house beamed with light, bringing the only little joy it could to feel homelier. Sollux's stomach began quenching for food, as he held onto it and furrowed his brows. He tossed the bag over onto the couch and headed for his very, _very_ cramped kitchen. You could barely fit 2 or 3 people in if you tried.

Opening the small fridge, he stuck his nose in and searched around it. There was nothing left that he could eat except a few apples and a couple of sauces. He didn't think apples and sauces went well together so he closed the fridge and took out the last slice of bread from the counter as well as the half empty honey jar. He made whatever he could with what he had, eating up the bread with honey quickly. He went back into the living room and slung his arm over the couch, bringing the bag up as he shoved his hand in and took out a wallet. He opened it, but there was hardly enough to go grocery shopping with, let alone pay the rent. He was in trouble now. He needed a part-time job, and fast. He supposed he'd have to leave that for another day, seeing as it was getting a little late for that.

It was time to call it a night and Sollux trudged his way to his bedroom, taking the mattress that was leaning against the wall and pulling it down as it went _thud _against the wooden floor. It was all he had and he couldn't really complain. Others had it worse, after all. He took his blanket from the side as well as a pillow and set the bed up, not taking long to finally lie down in it and getting comfortable. Bless his fathers for gifting him his blanket, it made him exceptionally warm that night.

He barely had anything, sure, but it was home and that was all that mattered.


End file.
